Applied Sports Science newsletter – January 8, 2016

Who needs Dirk Nowitzki? Or Wesley Matthews, Deron Williams and Zaza Pachulia, for that matter?

Not the Dallas Mavericks. At least not Wednesday night, when they managed to pull out a 100-91 win over the New Orleans Pelicans despite four starters resting 24 hours after a double-overtime victory.

“Nah, we need those guys,” guard Raymond Felton said with a smile after scoring 12 of his team-high 22 points in the fourth quarter and playing 37 minutes. “I’m tired. C’mon back!”

MORE THAN ANYTHING, a football manager thinks about winning. It’s the source of their happiness, their confidence and, ultimately, keeps them in employment. No manager can quite match Pep Guardiola in this regard. There is nothing more important to the soon to be former Bayern Munich coach than winning a football match. The thought never leaves his mind.

For Pep, who has, over the past six years, been unofficially anointed the ‘all knowing’ football coach, winning supersedes everything. He coaches to win, not to entertain (although he manages that in enormous quantities), not to facilitate tactical innovations or even show off his astonishingly adept ability at moulding a squad, just to win.

It’s no secret that Guardiola’s philosophy and understanding of the game came from Johan Cruyff. Guardiola has often been quoted as saying that the Dutch legend was his biggest idol and a mentor he had nothing but respect for. Cruyff’s influence on the young Guardiola is almost incalculable, learning from his coach’s every move.

Ever wonder about the future of football? Us too. So six of Sports Illustrated’s finest football minds—senior writers Greg Bishop, Michael Rosenberg and Jenny Vrentas, staff writer Emily Kaplan, deputy managing editor Jon Wertheim and SI.com special project editor Ben Eagle—got together to talk about what the sport and the league will look like in 50 years. The topics ranged from possible rule and gameplay changes to (intergalactic?) expansion, and everything in between. As with all predictions, there were disagreements. But the consensus was: Come time for Super Bowl 100 in the year 2066, football will likely bear little resemblance to the sport we now know.

What makes a successful match? What acts determine a victory or a loss? What was good, what was bad? DFB’s sports director Hansi Flick has spoken in a two-part interview with DFB.de about 2015 and 2016, and the new perception of playing at the DFB. In the first part, the focus is on his journey as sports director and the development of the guidelines for the new approach to the game.

DFB.de: Mr Flick, 2016 has begun, so what is first in your schedule for the new year?

Hansi Flick: On 9th January I am flying out to La Manga where the U16s and U17s are taking part in their usual training camp. I went to see it two years ago, and I liked it on that occasion. For me, proximity to the coaches, teams and players is very important. When I’m there I will have time to work with the players and general talk about things. Quite a lot of things will develop, especially in light of the new approach to the game that we have come up with at the DFB.

Enough of them start on the right path, but for most young soccer players — the story is the same.

Youth soccer players all across the word play and learn the rules, develop skills, play at higher levels and then, when they become teenagers, they stop playing and forget about the game altogether.

Nobody knows how many potential world stars are lost but a Texas-based organization is attempting to revolutionize the way all that talent is harvested, which has so far proved a big problem for American soccer.

… Fascinating research conducted by Wharton professor Katherine Milkman and her colleagues shows that we are more likely to start a diet, go to the gym, and make commitments to reach our goals around the start of a new year. But, the researchers found, we’re also more likely to make such moves toward self-improvement around other “temporal landmarks”: a birthday, a holiday, the start of a new semester, a new month, or even just a Monday, the start of a new week. Even without all the hoopla around New Year’s, we seem to seek out occasions to declare a fresh start, and these fresh starts work—for a while, at least.

Objectives

To investigate the impact of training modification on achieving performance goals. Previous research demonstrates an inverse relationship between injury burden and success in team sports. It is unknown whether this relationship exists within individual sport such as athletics.
Design

A prospective, cohort study (n?=?33 International Track and Field Athletes; 76 athlete seasons) across five international competition seasons.
Methods

Athlete training status was recorded weekly over a 5-year period. Over the 6-month preparation season, relationships between training weeks completed, the number of injury/illness events and the success or failure of a performance goal at major championships was investigated. Two-by-two table were constructed and attributable risks in the exposed (AFE) calculated. A mixed-model, logistic regression was used to determine the relationship between failure and burden per injury/illness. Receiver Operator Curve (ROC) analysis was performed to ascertain the optimal threshold of training week completion to maximise the chance of success.
Results

Likelihood of achieving a performance goal increased by 7-times in those that completed >80% of planned training weeks (AUC, 0.72; 95%CI 0.64-0.81). Training availability accounted for 86% of successful seasons (AFE?=?0.86, 95%CI, 0.46 to 0.96). The majority of new injuries occurred within the first month of the preparation season (30%) and most illnesses occurred within 2-months of the event (50%). For every modified training week the chance of success significantly reduced (OR?=?0.74, 95%CI 0.58 to 0.94).
Conclusions

Injuries and illnesses, and their influence on training availability, during preparation are major determinants of an athlete’s chance of performance goal success or failure at the international level.

Today Under Armour has announced a flotilla of fitness products, likely to take the cake for the most unique fitness products announced by one company at the show this week.

They’ve done so by partnering with HTC and delivering a physical box full of health and sport focused items including a WiFi scale, an activity tracker (with optical HR!), wireless headphones (with HR too!), a regular HR strap, and even a pair of running shoes with electronics permanently embedded in them. For realz.

It’s like someone got an open checkbook to develop fitness products and went all in with all the most popular fitness product segments. Even better, is that about three weeks ago I met them in NYC and got a walk-through of the products with the folks there. Following which I got to take this gigantic duffel bag full of boxed products with me to test out.

There’s a fine line between preparation and exhaustion … the players use science and the coaches monitor that science to see just where the players are. [video, pre-roll + 1:59]

… I’ve been using a pre-production unit (Perhaps it’s units because there are two shoes?) on all my runs the last few weeks, through snow, ice, and everything in between here, cold parts of Canada, and France. Let’s get started.

Oh, before we start, note that this isn’t a review. The shoes don’t come out till late February, and there’s a small listing of caveats on what Under Armour has allowed the press to discuss, which I outlined in my other Under Armour post for today.

If you are a betting person like me, you will wager on the likelihood of hamstring injuries. Our goal is to change the odds, not eliminate them unless you don’t plan on sprinting at high speeds. This article will cover mechanical tears in the hamstring muscle group, not talk about “cramps.” Research is clear that cramping is not always related to preparation of the body for sport.

I will outline a way to reduce injuries and a smarter way to rehabilitate them if things go south. I have had the luxury of working with some of the best minds and talents in professional sport, so will discuss both clinical research and best practices. The text will show proven fresh ideas that are far more efficient and effective than old methods that should be put to rest.

This article provides an update regarding the rehabilitation and ways to prevent recurrent hamstring injury. Although there is an increased knowledge of the hamstring muscle injuries, the incidence remains high. Exercise therapy is still the treatment of choice, with exercises in a lengthened position or using eccentric contraction mode being most effective.

It is important to understand that there are different types of injuries. The first one involves the biceps femoris’ long head and occurs during high speed running. The other injury occurs during movements leading to extensive lengthening of the hamstrings and involves the free proximal tendon of the semitendinosus.The recurrence rate is higher when the biceps femoris is involved. There is increasing evidence that the eccentric hamstring strength remains reduced, even when the patient has returned to sports activities. This may be a factor associated with the high recurrence rate. Moreover, it has been suggested that, if the lesion is closer to the ischial tuberosity, a longer time to return to play is required.

The current NFL season has not been a particularly good one for feet.

Feet have been taking a real beating, actually. Every Sunday, it seems, a new report has emerged about how some player’s foot or ankle has been battered or broken or snapped or sprained or torn or bruised or tweaked or “rolled up on.”

Take two of the NFL’s biggest stars, the Patriots’ Tom Brady and the Denver Broncos’ Peyton Manning. As if the old rivals didn’t have enough in common already (both QBs are in the homestretch of Hall of Fame careers, both have recently been swept up in a good bit of controversy), both enter the postseason dealing with injuries to their very high-profile hooves. Brady is reportedly suffering from a high ankle sprain, Manning from a torn plantar fascia.

… My suggestion to soccer athletes – and their parents – who are righteous about nutrition: lighten up and allow for freedom of religion! Live and let live. There are many paths to reaching our shared goal of being fit and healthy (as well as taking care of the planet by eating sustainably). Dessert and rest days can even be a part of your religion. They are a part of mine!